Led Zeppelin shows Houston a whole lotta love

If your ears were ringing when you woke up 40 years ago today, it might have been because you were suffering an aural hangover after seeing Led Zeppelin at the Houston Music Hall the night before.

Zeppelin brought its traveling show to Houston for the first time on Aug. 3, 1969. According to ledzepplin.com, it was their 68th show of their relentless tour of U.S. or Canada that had begun in Denver on Dec. 26, 1968. This was officially third North American tour of the year. Altogether, in beginning with Denver, Zeppelin would play 101 dates in North America in four tours and mix in others in the U.K. and Europe between their overseas tours.

Zeppelin was the only rock group scheduled to play the Newport Jazz Festival in July 5-6, 1969. After disturbances at the festival on Saturday night, producer George Wein, fearing a riot, cancelled Zeppelin’s Sunday night appearance. However, Zeppelin was allowed to close the festival after much of the overflow crowd had left.

However, Led Zeppelin chose not to take part in the biggest summer festival of them all: Woodstock. Zeppelin’s manager Peter Grant said: “I said no because at Woodstock we’d have just been another band on the bill”

Back in Houston, the Dallas band Southwest FOB, which included Dan Seals and John Colley, opened the sold-out show. (Those two were later found success as England Dan and John Ford Coley.)

Westbury High School student Tom Tannahill was in the overflow crowd at the show that night. He was blown away. Here are his memories:

Courtesy of Tom Tannahill

Tom Tannahill’s ticket stub from the Led Zeppelin concert at the Houston Music Hall on Aug. 3, 1969. This is just one of over 70 tickets of shows he attended displayed on his Web site.

I can’t remember a whole lot. I do remember getting blown away by them. I had bought there debut LP a few months prior and of course loved Dazed and Confused. I had no idea how (Jimmy) Page made the sounds that he did until I saw him live. It was the first time I saw anyone use a violin bow on an electric guitar. It was mesmerizing. The song seemed to go on forever yet you didn’t want it to end. (Robert) Plant used his voice like an instrument and played off Page’s amazing guitar sounds. (Drummer John) Bonham and (bassist John Paul) Jones were also incredible. Some bands did not carry over well from their studio to live performances. Zeppelin was a hundred times better live. You just knew if they stayed together this was going to be a rock super group. Given the incredible acoustics of the Music Hall and the sound system they had, my ears were ringing for several days, but I didn’t care.

Gary King, a student at Lamar Consolidated High School in Rosenberg, was at the concert with his garage band mates, sitting in the third row center. They were 17 at the time, except for the keyboard player, who was only 15. “We had to convince his parents that we would look after him in order to get them to let him go,” he said. Here’s some of what he remembers:

We arrived an hour before show time and the roadies were still setting up the equipment. Page had a wall of four Marshall stacks, fed by two tube heads sitting on a card table stage right. Bonham Jones had only a relatively small Acoustic bass amp, which prompted us to wonder if he would even be audible when Page cranked up. A crew member came out carrying Bonham’s Jone’s Fender bass, plugged it into the Acoustic and set it on a stand stage left. As he left, he reached down and tapped the E string with one finger. The resultant wave of sound felt like it rocked my seat, bolted to the concrete floor. Any questions we had about being able to hear evaporated.

The concert was something of a disappointment as the band didn’t seem intent on reproducing the album cuts and played some new material from the upcoming second album. It was loud, but I have heard louder concerts since. Page was amazing (still is). The crowd was surprisingly well-dressed, perhaps due to the Music Hall venue.

The Chronicle thought enough about this show to publish a rare-at-that-time review. The writer was entranced by Jimmy Page and thought his bandmates might be holding him back. Here’s the full review:

Page Is ‘Led Zeppelin’ Helium

Never trust anyone over 20 — that was the obvious attitude of the crowd overflowing the Led Zeppelin concert at the Music Hall.

A shoeless microbopper, denied even standing room, braced a reporter at a side entrance: “Did you come to cover the riot?” he asked, waving a $5 ticket. “If I don’t get in I may start one.”

Tempers cooled, however, as the 5-million decibel strobe-lit warmup by Southwest FOB, a local rock group, began — 20 minutes late.

Revert to Album

After a long intermission, Zeppelin led off its half of the Sunday night concert with “Sweet Baby,” a number obviously unfamiliar to the crowd. Sensing the terrain, the English group reverted to selections from its solo U.S.-released album.

Lead guitarist Jimmy Page is the helium in the Zeppelin. Primarily responsible for the group’s unique sound, he is almost a one-man, one-instrument rock band. Cross-fretting, picking, plunking, slapping, even bowing, Page utilizes the peculiarities of amplified guitar to produce dynamic contrasts, echo and simulated feedback effects.

Not All Turned On

In “White Summer,” the only solo performance of the evening, Page proved himself as provocative a new guitarist of the Gary Burdon group. Page, too, deserves an LP of his own. Free of the Zeppelin’s rather restricting format, his guitar becomes a self-accompanied sitar, perfectly suited to his complex, amplified style.

One’s first look at Zeppelin is rather disquieting. After the gutsy, masculine sound of its album, one anticipates four Steve McQueens with long hair. The frail, sensitive lead duo of the Zeppelin personifies the soul of unisex. But the music is what matters — and it’s early Hell’s Angels.